Lazy me

Dont't let my picture fool you. If I am looking like a lazy and laid back person, that is not true. I am ten times more lazy or laid back than I look in this ptcture. Yeah, thats me, simply love the lazy aspect of life. Sunday afternoons can make me go for relentless afternoon siestas. Maybe I will wake up a few times in the middle but then due to the tiredness of oversleeping, will go off to sleep again. Saturday evenings can make me stare at the tv set for hours without actually watching it, and damm those awesome fish tank screensavers.... just can't seem to get my eyes off them once they come on my laptop's screen. I cannot claim to be a writer or poet because, staring for me is a form of relaxation and not though process. Worrying thing is what will happen to me in ten years time. Hmmmmmm, let me think about that for a while.

Event....Full or Less

Someone once said "lead an eventful life".... I don't know if it can be otherwise. One more year passed by when I celebrated my nth birthday yesterday. It was a slow sunday and I woke up to a lovely bouquet of flowers in front of me. It was from office. A gesture even a professional cribber like me had to admire. There was nothing much in planned for the day since I am still searching for a reason as to why we celebrate birthdays in the first place. In spite of all the romanticism associated with birthdays, am still not sure what is the big achievment in being born. I guess its all the other things we achieve in life which makes our b'days so special for the simple reason that none of it would have otherwise happened.

During the course of the day all I did was answer some hundred telephone calls and replied to a host of messages. Started thinking somewhere along the way that what is it that I did or has happened around me in one year's time. Apart from parting ways with my ex organization and leaving the organization that I went to, could not remember anything significant. A little deeper introspection revealed a few other things like buying a few gizzmos, visiting at least 6 different places around delhi and trying out some "new to me" joints.

However, when I turned my attention to what has happened around me, here is what I saw; HSS got sold for the 3rd time, Raman Roy opened his fourth BPO, Quatrro. Roger Federer won the Wimbledon for the 5th time in a row defeating Raphael Nadal. A blueline delhi bus ran over a child for the 11th time. Kolkata got flodded by pre-monsoon rains for the 200th time in a row and the authorities were taken by surprise for the 200th time in a row. There were some first timers as well. Lalu Yadav took an IIM class for the first time. The "elite" political circle of this country decided to elect a women as the president for the first time among others. I must say that it was an eventful birthday for me.

Die Hard Version 4.0

Yesterday I watched Die Hard 4.0 and must confess that in spite of all the flaws that this movie has, enjoyed every second of it. There is always a debate going on in the intellectual circle of this world as to what defines a good movie. Well, I am no intellectual but have always categorized good movies as the ones which finish off in the blink of an eye and leave a lasting impression on your mind. Version 4.0 fits the bill. Or I should say Detective John Mclaine fits the bill. This movie is all about the screen presence of Bruce Willis and some mind blowing graphics that Hollywood was always popular for. Bruce Willis was a middle aged guy when he acted in Die Hard (the first movie in this series). Now he looks like one of the pre-historic dinosaurs of Jurassic Park. But looks apart his screen presence is still very strong. The story of this movie is probably the weakest of all the 3 die hards. A bunch of computer geeks start a pandemonium in DC by hacking every possible computer hub that exists in the east coast and since everything is run by computers in US, the entire country comes to a standstill. Of course to add to all this there is some NSA and CIA conspiracy embedded somewhere. Apparently after 9/11 NSA created an IT hub to back up all financial data of the entire country in one facility and in case of any emergency all data automatically starts downloading into this hub. Funnily enough this hub is guarded by only 5 or 6 guards with light weaponry and is the target or rather a sitting duck for the terrorists this time around. That is really all the story that this movie has and I don’t think anyone who is watching this movie is really bothered about this story. The excitement of the movie lies in the climax of the small action sequences and how they have been portrayed in the screen. The cinematography is simply awesome and I would be surprised if it is not nominated for Academy Awards for best action sequence or rather sequences. I was not very interested to watch this movie when it was released. One reason of course was because it is a sequel. We all know the reputation of sequels. Besides who adds a suffix like 4.0??? It is like implementing version control in power point presentations. However I did go for it and enjoyed it thoroughly. It is a must watch for all who have forgotten the taste of a good action movie by watching too much romantic comedies and dramas. In short someone like me. Now I wonder when they will come up with Die Hard 4.0.1.

My Newest Toy

A couple of weeks ago I finally went for it. The long debated wireless Internet connection. Months of thorough research about wireless data cards finally came to an end when I bought the Reliance Netconnect Data Card. My options were slim anyways because of the fact that my laptop does not have a PCMCI slot. Therefore I required a USB connection. My options were Tata Indicom and Reliance, since they are the only ones to market the USB card at present. Tata was charging almost 1K higher than Reliance and both were promising the same speed. Of course I knew that the promised speed of 153 kbps is wishful thinking since that is too high a speed to get from GPRS Technology. I also read the endless criticisms posted on the web about how reliance cheats its customers by over promising and not delivering. You can say that for once I decided to get cheated first hand. The sheer concept of wireless Internet connectivity was too sumptuous a prospect and I had to try it.

I have been using the card for a little over 2 weeks now. The USB modem came from HUAWEI Technologies (China). It looks pretty neat and weighs almost nothing. I have opted for a plan called "Freedom at Night" that offers unlimited connectivity and download between 10 pm and 6 am and I thank my lucky stars for choosing this plan. In my daily usage of 2 to 3 hours at night, I am somehow managing to download 50 mb of data per day. That with an uptime of about 85 to 90%. The data transfer speed that I am getting is about 40 to 90 kbps which is pretty decent considering that my office T1 can offer a best of about 250 kbps. The download speed is anywhere between 4 KB and 15 KB depending upon website latency. All in all it is a pretty decent toy to have if you have a nomadic life like me. At least you can get all the junk work and some important work done from home without having to run to a cyber cafe every time. On a lighter side, my Internet connection always seem to work whenever I do some junk work like orkut and Internet radio. It seems to stutter only when I try to get some office work done. Keeps me motivated though.

Never enjoyed the rain so much

Its wired how every day of our lives are unique in their own ways... most times we choose to ignore this uniqueness and concetrate on the "gains and losses" or start planning for the next day rather than enjoying each day. Today is 25th June and I have completed exactly 6 years of a journey called job. Still remember this day in 2001 when I was a shy and kid who walked into a big building in Noida Sector 58 and started a journey. Things have changed since then and that kid is long gone. Did not remember this fact till the time I started writing....

From this morning I was waiting for the day to end. Monday blues, the heat of Delhi combined with 90% relative humidity made it impossible to even come out of the office for a smoke. when the day ended I boarded the office cab with a sigh of relief and noticed lightning flashing in the sky. Round about 10 pm a cool wind started to blow and by the time I reached home It started to pour. Took my evening beauty shower (the tank water was still warm) and turned on the internet radio, some contemporary jazz very soothing. A gust of cold wind swept me and I realized that it has been 6 years since I have been travelling.

It is still raining and I must confess that I never enjoyed the rain so much as I look over my shoulder to the last 6 years of my journey and all the experiences I have gathered in this time.